What is the tone of this literary-theoretical tone? Take away anything from reading these books together and it’s their similar vibe: something quietly persistent, invested in its own disinvestments, obsessive rather than obsessed; something that can’t notice without feeling implicated in what’s been noticed and so isn’t prone to anger. Hard as it is to wrap one’s hands around the vaporousness of tone, I’d still risk a label. The tone of the moment, if you take these books as a guide, is a habitual mordancy.